The Forest app has been developed to help people stay focused and avoid the temptation of checking their smartphone. When you open the forest app, a virtual seed is planted and takes 30 minutes for it to grow into a tree. For the entire duration of the tree’s growth, your smartphone has to have the Forest app open, otherwise the little tree will unfortunately die.

When planting a tree, you can change the species of tree and how long it will take to grow — up to a maximum of two hours.

For each tree that you successfully grow, it is placed in a virtual forest. A calendar sits below the forest to let you compare days and see when you were most productive.

Forest is available for iPhone, Android, Windows Phone, and the Chrome and Firefox browsers. In each case you can choose “safe apps and websites” that you are allowed to visit without your tree dying.